APOPKA, Fla. – Two political rivals in Apopka are now taking their fight from the campaign trail to the courtroom.
The city’s mayor is suing his challenger, claiming she should not even be on the ballot. She is firing back, calling it a desperate move just weeks before voters decide.
Apopka Mayor Bryan Nelson, who is running for reelection, is suing an opponent, Orange County Commissioner Christine Moore, to get her taken off the ballot.
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In a lawsuit filed Tuesday and obtained by News 6 Investigator Mike DeForest, Nelson claims Moore did not live in the city long enough to meet residency requirements.
“What she was doing was illegal. You have to live in the city for a year before,” Nelson told News 6 on Wednesday.
Nelson is citing Sec. 4.03 in the Apopka City Code of Ordinances, which states:
“Each member of the city council, which includes the mayor, shall be a resident of the City of Apopka, Florida, for a period of one year next preceding his or her election to office and shall be a registered voter pursuant to Florida law.”
Nelson says Moore listed two addresses as her places of residence on her qualifying application to prove that she lived within Apopka city limits for a year before the election: one she lived at before July 18, and another she lived at after July 19.
News 6 spoke to Moore over the phone on Tuesday night. She said she did everything right by the law, renting a home off Magnolia Street, inside city limits, while she finished closing the purchase of the second.
“I was looking, but it became clear I wasn’t going to find a house in time, so I rented a room to meet the residency requirement,” Moore told News 6 in an interview on Wednesday.
Nelson says he took dozens of photos between April and July of 2024, showing Moore’s car parked most mornings at a home she owns outside city limits.
He says Moore’s car was only observed at the Magnolia Street house once before July 18.
The lawsuit says Moore’s car was photographed at a third home for 70 days between 6 a.m. and 7 a.m. in a period between April 16 and July 18.
That home has an Apopka postal code, but is actually just outside city limits, according to the Orange County property appraiser’s website. Moore owns this home as well.
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Moore called Nelson’s claims “false and misleading” and fired back, accusing him of annexing his own home and two other properties into the city in 2018.
“He had three homes out of the entire neighborhood annexed,” Moore said. “Now we have two sets of garbage trucks and I have two police departments going down there. That’s so he could run for mayor.”
Nelson requested the annexation, according to city records, and the city council approved it unanimously in September of 2016, almost two years before he became mayor.
“I did get annexed into the city, absolutely, but I met the spirit of the law and the requirements. We were annexed a year and a half or two years before,” Nelson said.
[WATCH: Lawsuit accuses Apopka councilwoman of living outside city borders]
Nelson also accuses Moore of paying her qualifying fee improperly, with a check that did not bear the signature of Moore’s campaign treasurer, as per state law.
Moore disputed the claim. “There’s a separate section in Florida law, and there are requirements there for a particular type of account. I have the signatory as well as the treasurer.”
Nelson also points out in the lawsuit that Moore does not have a homestead exemption for her new home. But she says she is in the process of getting that and believes a homestead exemption is not required as proof of residency.
News 6 checked, and there is no homestead exemption requirement in the Apopka ordinances or in state law.
The qualifying period for the Apopka mayor’s race already ended.
Nelson and Moore are also running against Apopka City Commissioner Nicholas Nesta.
The election is set for March 10.